The St. Petersburg branch of the Russian Justice Ministry is taking the city’s bar chamber to court over its refusal to take disciplinary action against prominent human rights lawyer Ivan Pavlov.
Pavlov’s defense attorney Alexander Meleshko told the state news agency TASS that the lawsuit was filed over the St. Petersburg bar association’s refusal to satisfy the Justice Ministry’s petition to disbar Pavlov due to the fact that he declined to sign a non-disclosure agreement regarding the treason case against former journalist Ivan Safronov.
A hearing on the Justice Ministry’s lawsuit against the bar association is scheduled for August 24.
Pavlov and Safronov’s other lawyers refused to sign non-disclosure agreements in connection with his case in the summer of 2020. In turn, the Russian Justice Ministry appealed to the Moscow and St. Petersburg bar chambers with requests for disciplinary action against the members of Safronov’s defense team. Both bar chambers refused.
In April 2021, the Russian authorities detained Ivan Pavlov on charges of disclosing information from a pretrial investigation. Pavlov was banned from using the Internet and mobile communications ahead of the trial, as well as from contacting witnesses in the case against him (including Safronov). If convicted, he faces up to three months in jail and disbarment.
In July, the human rights group Team 29, which was headed by Ivan Pavlov, announced that it was disbanding to protect its members and supporters from criminal prosecution. This came just days after Russia’s censorship agency blocked Team 29’s website for allegedly publishing content from an “undesirable organization.”
Read more about Ivan Pavlov and ‘Team 29’
- ‘We’re like a bone in their throat’ After seven years of defending Russia’s most difficult political cases, prominent legal group Team 29 disbands fearing prosecution
- ‘They believe I committed a crime’ Detention of prominent human rights lawyer Ivan Pavlov accompanied by raids on his home and office in St. Petersburg
- The final straw Human rights attorney Ivan Pavlov faces disbarment after agreeing to represent Team Navalny in court. A colleague says a state investigator has threatened him for years.
- No soldiers but ready for battle For years, lawyers at Team 29 have taken on some of Russia’s most hopeless human rights cases. Now federal charges against the group’s leader are testing the team’s resolve.
The Safronov Case
On July 7, 2020, federal agents arrested Ivan Safronov on treason charges. According to the FSB, Safronov passed state secrets to Czech intelligence when he was working as a journalist for the business newspaper Kommersant in 2017. Safronov maintains that he isn’t guilty and his defense lawyers are confident that he is being persecuted for his previous journalistic work. While investigators insist that Safronov’s case has nothing to do with his journalism, they did offer him a plea deal in exchange for naming his journalistic sources. Safronov has refused all offered plea bargains.
What does this mean?
Potential disciplinary measures that can be taken against lawyers include reprimands, warnings, or disbarment.